I am doing a very small wedding cake for a friend and she mentioned 3 square layers, stacked, for 20 people. I assume she wants the squares to be different sizes.

In looking at my square pans, there doesn't seem to be a way to make a 3 layer square cake for only 20 people. Am I wrong?

Can it even be done with two layers? She wants a top layer to take home and keep for her 1st anniversary. Can I suggest just making her a separate cake for her anniversary?

Thanks in advance.

..moving to Cake Ideas.

Not really...squares serve more than rounds and even a 9" round topped by a 6" round serves at least 30.

It sounds like she just wants the 3 tiers for height and show...why not make one layer a "dummy" cake? I did a cake like that to serve 45 people. the bottom was what served the guest, the middle was fake. i got one offline from ebay fairly cheap but i've heard of some people using foam and the top tier was real and kept by the groom and bride (my sister). all tiers where decorated exactly the same and no one ever detected it.

to help keep detection hidden when we were ready to cut and serve we took off the top two tiers and put them to the side and just cut from the bottom one, we didnt end up finishing the bottom so no one saw that we didnt cut into the other two. hope this helps. good luck!

Sometimes brides don't realize that they can't get the exact servings they want if they want a certain design/style. They have to pay for more servings than they need if they really want it to look a certain way. If this is for free, then that wouldn't really be as much of an issue, though.

Ah yes, dummy cake! What a great idea! I will talk to her about this!

Thanks so much everyone.

Just remember, you should charge as much for a dummy as for cake - you have to do all the decorating still, and the foam isn't cheap.